On Mullie, Mallozzi, and Original Characters
And speaking of shaping your story to the show, let me take off my writer's hat for a moment and put on my producer's hat (the one that clamps off the blood vessels and lowers my IQ fifteen points). If there's any one problem that television producers have with freelance writers, it's the tendency of the writers to want to do stories about what they want to write about, as opposed to what's best for the show. As writer/producer, you create a number of characters and invest time and effort working out their backgrounds, histories, interests, relationships. All of this is given to the freelancer when she comes in for the initial meeting. You wait a week or two, then the writer comes in, and you expect to hear a great story about your characters...
And what you get is a story about an outside character who comes in and has adventures, a story in which your regular characters are passive participants or downright irrelevant.
This sort of thing happens all the time in television. I've never worked on a series yet, or talked to anyone doing so, in which the producers haven't found themselves tearing their hair out after a while because they can't get anyone to write about their characters. So when you do develop your story, take this lesson to heart: If you can make your tale about the regular characters on the series, and not the guest star, and make it interesting and compelling, you will not only sell, you will work forever."
J. Michael Straczynski, The Complete Book of Scriptwriting. Writer's Digest Books, Cinncinnati, Ohio, 1996. pp. 28-29
So, let's talk about the guest stars. I, for one, am not tuning in each week to see the cool guest star. The only guest star I've heard of people tuning in to see on Stargate has been Peter Wingfield as Tanith. I really enjoyed both Wingfield and Marina Sirtis' guest appearance as Svetlana Markov, but Wingfield and Sirtis are the exceptions that prove the rule, in my opinion; fans do not generally tune in to their favorite show to see original characters. They tune in to see the series regulars they know and love.
Most fanfic authors know this. They know that however brilliant, entertaining, and compelling their original characters may be, their readers are reading their story for the series regulars. They want to see Jack, Daniel, Sam, and Teal'c, and they want them to be doing cool stuff. They want the series regulars to have adventures. The fans can't get enough of the series regulars, and that's why people read fan fiction.
I see people in the guestbook have dissed Mullie and Mallozzi's writing. I don't think it's true that they can't write; they've written several episodes I enjoyed, most notably "The Curse." I do think that if Mullie and Mallozzi have one fatal flaw as scriptwriters, however, it's that they are far more interested in their original characters than they are the series regulars. Please note that it's difficult to quantify "too much attention paid to guest star" without counting lines or such, so what follows is my impression of the season four episodes they've written:
"Window of Opportunity," by P. Mullie and J. Mallozzi. I thought this was a very cute, very funny episode. I didn't think Jack and Teal'c did much that was particularly daring for having "no consequences," and frankly, if I were to kiss Sam I'd want her to remember it, but generally an enjoyable episode. However, the emotional punch comes from Malakai, not from any member of SG-1. Malakai is a very moving character, one written with a lot of genuine feeling, and I had a lot of compassion for his motivations. Malakai creates the problem, and Malakai solves it when he and Jack have a moment of understanding about grief. One doesn't really get much insight into SG-1 other than that one moment between Malakai and Jack, but I'm willing to cut the episode some slack on that because Mallozzi and Mullie seem to have something to say about grief and second chances here under the fluff and laughs. I just wish SG-1 had more to do than riding bikes in the halls, getting hit in the face, etc. All in all, a very promising first Stargate episode.
"Scorched Earth," by P. Mullie and Joseph Mallozzi. This is a very controversial episode among fans who feel that Jack is wrong, wrong, wrong in this episode. I'm going to take a contrary view here and say that Jack is, in my opinion, all about being a protector, and he sees a threat to people who are his responsibility to protect and is pulling a mama bear here. The real interest in this story is Daniel's attempts to convince the android Lotan to spare the Enkarans. Lotan and Daniel are both very sensitively written; the conflict, on the other hand, seems a little forced. You'd think that a ship capable of creating Lotan would notice the sentient life forms before starting the process, and the ethical differences between Jack and Daniel are a little too black-and-white and show little of the mutual affection and respect of seasons one through three. I smell convenience and prefabricated conflict. But in general, a good episode for their second in the series.
"Point of No Return," by Paul Mullie and Joseph Mallozzi. Okay, this episode is funny. Really, really funny. I particularly liked the Jack and Teal'c bits in the hotel. But by this time I'd be expecting Mullie and Mallozzi to be more in touch with the series regulars instead of continuing to write episodes that are mostly about the guest stars, and in my opinion they're writing less about the series regulars and more about guest stars. Mullie and Mallozzi may be the worst offenders on this point, but they aren't the only offenders, and the original characters are starting to get intrusive. I'd expect the Executive Producer to be reining in their tendency to rely on original characters while the series regulars twiddle their thumbs, but this obviously didn't happen.
"The Curse," by Paul Mullie and Joseph Mallozzi. I love this episode! Did I mention that I love this episode? Mullie and Mallozzi again write Daniel really, really well, and Sam had some great character moments, too. I also enjoyed Jack and Teal'c at the pond with no fish. What I didn't enjoy was Jack being so annoyed that Daniel dared to call him that he disassembled his cellphone. Huh? Where'd that come from? And the computer science was really, really bad, but it was only one line so I forgive them. But for once, the series regulars saved the day and did a lot of the interesting stuff. The original characters were also prominent, but they were the antagonists, so that's to be expected, and they were introduced through their relationship to a series regular (Daniel), so in developing Sarah and Steven, they develop Daniel. This is a great script. They got almost everything right in this one. Great stuff, and exactly how you should do guest stars, in my opinion.
"Chain Reaction," by Paul Mullie and Joseph Mallozzi. You know what I'm going to say, don't you? I was very, very happy to have a Hammond episode; I'm very fond of Hammond and it was nice to see more of him and see his relationship with his granddaughters that was established in season three's "Crystal Skull." And Jack certainly didn't sit around and twiddle his thumbs here. Jack and Maybourne have a lot of chemistry, and it's certainly true that they couldn't have used any of the regulars the way they used Maybourne. Maybourne is also a great foil for Jack because of Jack's special ops background; Jack has distate for Maybourne's ethics but he can play Maybourne's variety of hardball as well as Maybourne can. I'd like to see more of the team, but the episode is only an hour long. In some later episodes Maybourne-as-Krycek gets a little intrusive, but here he's used to develop Jack. All in all, pretty good.
"Prodigy," by Brad Wright, Joseph Mallozzi, and Paul Mullie. This episode is a real stinker. Bad. Really, really bad. Everyone's entitled to at least one, but this one is bad for the reasons I've harped on above: Hailey does all the interesting stuff while SG-1 stands around with their thumbs up their asses oohing and ahhing about how brilliant Hailey is. If this episode were fanfic, readers would brand it a Mary Sue story; Hailey is an obvious authorial surrogate, the authors' baby who can do no wrong. She does stupid things and is praised for it. Let's face it; Hailey is the Wesley Crusher of Stargate--the obnoxious little can-do-no-wrong know-it-all that the authors love and the audience hates. I'm trying to think of something nice to say about it and am coming up blank. Um, the actress playing Hailey did her best with the material, but one is still left with the impression that Sam's helping Hailey out is due to her brain being stolen by aliens. This one looks particularly bad after episodes like "The Curse," where Mullie and Mallozzi show us exactly how well they can write this show. The only excuse I can think of for this episode is they were short on scripts and one of the three of them happened to have this old thing lying around their closets dating from before "Window of Opportunity." I don't know whether to blame Brad Wright or Mullie and Mallozzi, but there's plenty of blame to go around on this script.
"Exodus," by Paul Mullie and Joseph Mallozzi. This one is guest-star-heavy, but the guest stars are used well. There's Tanith, who has a relationship with Teal'c, and Sam's dad Jacob. I always enjoy seeing Sam and Jacob interact. There were also some really good Daniel and Teal'c moments. There's a lot of plot and action, and still room for good characterization. Again, they get it right.
At this point, the two newcomers have written a large portion of season four--seven out of twenty-two episodes--apparently without much guidance from the production staff. They have more credits on season four than any other writers, and in fact have more than twice as many credits as any other writer (Robert C. Cooper, Brad Wright, and Peter DeLuise each wrote three, and one of Wright's is a co-credit with Mullie and Mallozzi).
"Enemies," by Robert C. Cooper, Brad Wright, Joseph Mallozzi, and Paul Mullie. Yay! Jack and Daniel being friends! Those of us who are into the Jack and Daniel buddy thing did the happy dance at the great friendship scenes in this one. We missed this in season four. We also had the father/daughter pessimism show. You can really see Jacob's influence on Sam in this one. Good work.
"The Fifth Man," by Joseph Mallozzi and Paul Mullie. This is a really good episode. Unfortunately, it's a really good episode about Tyler. I did enjoy watching Jack interact with Tyler; Mullie and Mallozzi write Jack really well in this one: "It's a joke. An attempt to divert attention from my obvious heroism... you'll get used to it." It's a great showcase for Dion Johnstone as Tyler, who is very appealling. But dang, guys--it's your ninth episode. You should be writing more about the regulars by now. I'm afraid I find Col. Simmons to be a complete snooze, but he does provide Daniel an opportunity to be adorably snarky with him in this one.
"The Tomb," by Joseph Mallozzi and Paul Mullie. False peril abounds in this episode; SG-1 and the Russians get conveniently trapped in a Ziggurat with a monster of the week that may also be a Goa'uld. The characters occasionally behave in illogical ways to advance the plot (Why pair the two characters who can sense a Goa'uld together? Because otherwise you wouldn't get a Russian Goa'uld? Convenience is the enemy of good writing). The most interesting character is, alas, the Russian Colonel. I really wanted to like this episode because it had Daniel being an archaeologist, but... The ending with the nyah-nyah reaction shot was adorable despite the plot holes.
"Desperate Measures," by Joseph Mallozzi and Paul Mullie. Okay, I found Maybourne really intrusive in this one despite--shallow alert!--Tom McBeath looking really good scruffy. They also apparently recycled an old Xena: Warrior Princess script on this one; I kept waiting for Sam to do Xena's traditional war cry and run up a wall. Jack is paired with Maybourne to much less interesting effect than in "Chain Reaction," Sam imitates Xena, Daniel and Teal'c twiddle their thumbs, and Col. Simmons is still snore-worthy. I found this one too boring to comment further.
"Wormhole X-treme!" by Jospeh Mallozzi and Paul Mullie. The biggest problem with this episode is the fact that satire requires familiarity with the material. "Wormhole X-treme!" is more a parody of the science fiction genre in general than it is of Stargate SG-1. And it's an episode about Marty from "Point of No Return." Didn't we get enough of him the first time? It's funny, but... a 100th episode? I personally find Marty funny, but not compelling enough for two entire episodes to be written about him. I'd rather see Tyler or Malakai again.
Mullie and Mallozzi can write. They also helped produce what I consider the worst script Stargate has ever filmed ("Prodigy"). They can write Jack and Daniel really well. They don't write Jack and Daniel together very well ("Enemies" excepted), and they don't seem very interested in team episodes (a serious handicap for a show with an ensemble cast). They're a lot more interested in individual character showcases and guest stars. The quality of their episodes depends almost entirely on their ability to control their enthusiasm for their original characters and focus on the stars. Brad Wright must take a large part of the blame for their failures; Wright is apparently unable to recognize and verbalize to Mullie and Mallozzi the difference between one of their good scripts and one of their bad scripts. Instead, Wright acts as their enabler on the appallingly awful "Prodigy." Obviously, if Wright isn't going to curb their worst writing impulses, Mullie and Mallozzi are going to have to have the discipline to overcome their natural writer's tendency to favor their own characters for the good of the show. Mullie and Mallozzi are getting worse about favoring their own characters, not better. My impression of season five to date is that in the absence of any leadership from Wright, Mullie and Mallozzi are growing ever more self-indulgent, much to their own, Wright's, and the show's detriment.
I'd like to take this opportunity to do Wright's job for him and explain to Mullie and Mallozzi precisely why I think "Prodigy" is awful and "The Curse" excellent. On the surface, they're very similar episodes: A member of Stargate SG-1 returns to a school they attended in the past. However, in "The Curse," Daniel attends his professor's funeral and investigates a possible Goa'uld. This is a much more compelling conflict than "Prodigy," where Sam returns to the Academy, meets a difficult but brilliant young cadet, and randomly decides to mentor her. The conflict in "The Curse" also arises naturally out of Daniel's troubled history with Steven (a rival) and Sarah (his ex-girlfriend), their possible involvement in the death of his professor, and the fact that one of them might be a Goa'uld. The conflict in "Prodigy" is artificially created by making Hailey a pain in the ass. Finally, Hailey is developed and promoted to the exclusion and detriment of the series regulars; Sam's involvement with her is convenient and arbitrary. Sarah and Steven are developed by showing their former relationship with Daniel; their development enhances Daniel's development. It is, granted, slightly convenient that Sarah, like Shaure, ends up a Goa'uld, but given Daniel's luck in romantic relationships on this show (including a pusher and a mass murderer) it's probably par for the course. By way of contrast, everything about "Prodigy" is convenient, including the way it contradicted the way zats have worked in the past.
Every script mentioned here--well, almost every script, but I tailored this list to Mullie and Mallozzi's strengths and weaknesses--can be judged on the following points:
Brad Wright, are you listening? I suspect you're not throwing stones here because you're not without sin, if you catch my drift and you should because your name is on the writing credits for "Prodigy." Mullie and Mallozzi are talented but need a strong leader with vision to point out when they're satisfying their own whims rather than what's good for the show. If you can't or won't edit, you should get one of the other writers to do it (Robert C. Cooper, perhaps? he consistently writes about the regulars). You're doing them and yourself a grave disservice by not giving them constructive feedback; they're capable of turning out excellent scripts, but without guidance you're not getting their best work out of them. This is a failure of vision and leadership on your part; the appearance is that you have completely lost interest in this show and dumped it on the newcomers, who appear to consider your series their private playground.
Katherine
(c) Katherine, 2002. All rights recognised. No copyright infringement intended.
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